Recent large scale recalls of contaminated beef in Canada emphasize the critical need for improved monitoring. InDevR, a privately-held company developing innovative life science instrumentation, is hosting a webinar on rapid detection of foodborne E. coli by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) using InDevR's ampliPHOX® technology.

Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) is an enteric pathogen known to cause human gastrointestinal illnesses with diverse clinical manifestations. The varying disease severity has been associated with certain O-antigen serotypes as well as a variety of virulence genes. The rise in foodborne-related STEC outbreaks has heightened the importance of developing improved methods to rapidly detect and characterize virulent STEC isolates. However, current detection tools, such as real-time PCR and high-density DNA microarrays using fluorescence detection, are either too costly or too complex for routine pathogen surveillance. The use of a low-density DNA microarray, in conjunction with ampliPHOX Colorimetric Detection Technology, allows for rapid and cost-effective identification of highly relevant O-antigens and virulence-associated factors in STEC isolates recovered from a major produce production region in California.

This webinar will be presented by Dr. Beatriz Quiñones, a Research Molecular Biologist in the Produce Safety and Microbiology Research Unit at the USDA's Western Regional Research Center in Albany, California. For the past 7 years, the research objectives of her laboratory have been aimed at developing multiplex assays to genotype and characterize foodborne pathogens that have been implicated in produce-associated outbreaks.

InDevR's ampliPHOX Colorimetric Detection Technology, which consists of the ampliPHOX Reader instrument and a line of consumables, is an inexpensive alternative to fluorescence detection for both nucleic acid and protein microarray applications. The detection technology is easy to use and can be completed in minutes. Reagents are applied to the array, and the Reader then uses light to induce polymerization on low-density microarrays, images the resulting pattern of visual spots, automatically interprets the image, and provides the user with immediate results. To learn more about ampliPHOX, please visit www.indevr.com or register for the webinar at www.indevr.com/webinars.

About InDevRInDevR develops breakthrough life science instrumentation and assays for scientists and researchers, with a primary focus on the issues associated with virus quantification and pathogen detection. InDevR's lead product is a flow cytometer called the ViroCyt 2100® Virus Counter®, which has been optimized to rapidly quantify micro-organisms in applications such as vaccine manufacturing, drug development, water quality monitoring and other areas important to human health. InDevR's ampliPHOX is an innovative new colorimetric detection system that makes the power of lower density microarrays available to a broad range of researchers developing both nucleic acid and protein multiplexed assays. For more information, please visit www.indevr.com.